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Moving House Tips

Moving House Tips

As you know we recently moved house (twice) and I will say apart from one of our solicitors, it was pretty stress-free. So I thought I’d put together my moving house tips for anyone who’s about to move.

Get started early

Don’t wait until the day you are moving to get started on the packing. I started decluttering a few weeks before we moved. Give items you no longer want to charity, sell things, just clear out what you don’t want or need any more. There’s no need to move items you know you are never going to use.

Shop around

If you are looking for packing supplies, shop around for the best priced bubble wrap and boxes. If you put the word out early enough, then people will start saving boxes and bubble wrap for you. It will save a lot of money in the long run.

Have a clear plan of action

On moving day, make sure you have lots of help and also make sure that everyone knows what they are supposed to be doing. If you are the one co-ordinating, try not to do everything yourself as there will be people want to ask you questions. You’ll need to make yourself available to make quick decisions.

Feed and water everyone

No one likes working all day for no reward. Get in lots of snacks for the workers (either paid or voluntary), a nice lunch and even a thank you present for them to take home with them. Make sure everyone knows they can help themselves to drinks and snacks and offer out lots of cups of tea.

Be realistic

Know that you might not get everything done in one day. Know what the must-dos are and work on those first. As long as you are out of your old property and you are in your new one with all your stuff, that’s a result.

Essentials

The top one of the moving house tips. Make sure you have the essentials handy in your new house. A kettle is a must. Disposal cups, plates and glasses can be a godsend if you aren’t sure which boxes will arrive/be unpacked first. Ask the previous owner/tenant to leave the fridge switched on so you can store lunch food, milk and cold drinks. Pack a hand towel for the bathroom, some hand soap and toilet roll in a separate bag.

Clean first

We cleaned the first day we moved in. It made much more sense to do that, so we weren’t in a position where we were trying to unload boxes when we wanted to clean top to bottom. If you are moving out and into a new house on the same day, you may not have that luxury. But you could limit the arriving furniture and boxes to one or two rooms and then clean the others first. We were lucky that the previous owners had cleaned really well but I know that some people end up with a big cleaning job.

Pack well

Don’t put heavy items in big boxes. Save the bigger boxes for cushions, duvets, things like that. If you make your boxes too heavy, they will be difficult to move and make break. Use bubblewrap on anything you think might break. Label the boxes well so they are easy to unpack the other end. I packed and labelled everything, but my other half, much to everyone’s amusement decided to relabel some of the boxes. People did wonder what was in the box labelled ‘big duck’. It was a winter duvet by the way.

I hope your move is stress-free and I really hope this article helps you plan.

This post is a collaborative post with estate agent thepersonalagent.co.uk

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33 thoughts on “Moving House Tips”

Good tips. I'm moving soon and I hate moving! Have been doing the gradual decluttering. It is the cleaning thing that is really stressing me - I HAVE to clean a new house myself, even if looks clean. So far have always been able to do that on moves prior to having to get stuff in (& without having two toddlers), but this time I'm not sure will be possible & it is really bothering me! #AnythingGoes

I know exactly what you mean. Luckily our new house was really clean, but I did still clean everything, but it's nice to know that you are cleaning because you want to and not because you have to. Good luck with your move. Hope it goes smoothly.

These are really great tips, I hate the action of moving. Even if the end is a much better place, the moving itself is a buggar. The last time we moved was 10 years ago. The home we were living in was too small, someone made us an offer, a good one, but we had to move in 28 days. ARG! We hadn't looked for a house and it was winter. We ended up finding one and rushing the closing. But even so, we had almost 3 weeks of living at my parents home 1.5 hours away from school and work. That winter was horrendous, we drove through snow storms for the entire 3 weeks, in the dark. In fact, the day we moved in it was a slight blizzard, we slept on the floor of the new house because we couldn't get to our storage unit through the snow. LOL

I wish I would have had your list back then, these are great tips. I'm pinning for the future, we are soon to be empty nesters, then we won't need such a large home. Although I dislike moving I can see it in our future!

Thanks Nikki. That sounds horrendous. Maybe I should add to the list, only move in the summer. Although we've had some pretty hot days and decorating in 30 degrees plus heat isn't much fun either. Maybe it's a Spring/Autumn activity?

We moved in April. What a nightmare! Still need to decorate things how I want them but getting there. We downsized and there are so many things! These are great tips! Thanks for linking up to #AnythingGoes Janet

Oh this is fab! I moved house when my girl was 3 months old and agree with all of this...it took a lot longer than we thought to get everything in place and it's good to be realistic of what you can get done in the timeframe. Thank you for linking up to #dreamteam xx

Great tips, I just moved house too and had 10 weeks to get organised and clean the old house and the new and co-ordinate the renovation at the new house, planning was everything and it all went smoothly and stress free because of it! #dreamteam

Wonderful tips! Moving house can be so stressful but getting organised early can really help. Sadly, I was unable to take this advice myself when we last moved five years ago as circumstances led us to be moving two days before our wedding and with less than a week between exchange and completion so we were still packing the morning the movers arrived lol! But hey ho, it worked out well in the end xx #tuesdaytreasures

Such great advice here and timely because I am helping my mom move this weekend! First into my house (eek!) and then in a few months, back out into her new house! I agree that starting packing as early as possible is very important. And of course when you have help - feed the helpers! 🙂

Some great tips - you can tell when tips are good that the person has experience in that area! Hope you don't have to move again for a long time. We haven't done it for several years and I'm still in no hurry to do the packing and unpacking thing again!